Success rate of countries running for a seat on the United Nations Security Council for the first time

There is a belief among Baltic diplomats that contested United Nations (UN) Security Council (UNSC) elections reflect the UN General Assembly’s (UNGA) support for countries that have not yet been elected members and are running for this seat for the first time. However, no established research provides a systematic analysis of this topic; therefore, it presents a research gap that warrants precise examination. This interdisciplinary article draws on fields of international relations, international law, and econometrics. It tests the hypothesis that countries that have not been members of the UNSC and run for a non-permanent seat for the first time have a higher chance of being elected. A dataset covering 35 election cycles across five UN electoral regional groups has been analysed. Methodologically, descriptive statistics and econometric regression are performed. The paper uses a Linear Probability Model (LPM) to examine the relationship between being a first-time candidate and the likelihood of election to the UNSC. The analysis refutes the hypothesis. Nonetheless, the findings reveal regional variations in two electoral groups in which first-time candidates outperform repeat candidates. These results suggest that although the hypothesis cannot be confirmed overall, regional dynamics warrant further study using a larger dataset.